ASUS My Cinema-PE9400 Vs Hauppauge WinTV-HVR-1600 Combo TV Tuner Card Showdown

[Brandontw]

Hey there, I know when I was shopping for a TV tuner card, there wasn't much info out on this one, but i took the plunge anyway, so i just want to try to get the word out there that this is a great card. We just have extended basic cable, and i wanted a way to pipe it through my computer.

Hauppauge WinTV-HVR-1600
I decided I wanted to give a tuner a try last weekend, so I went and picked up a Hauppauge WinTV-HVR-1600 at Circuit City for 79.99 to see if a TV tuner was even worth the trouble or not. The software included with the Hauppauge is completely unusable, but the functionality within Media Center was very impressive. The remote that came with the Hauppauge just straight up didn’t work at all, let alone for media center, and the picture quality was a little bit disappointing. In addition all of the accessories seemed subpar, the remote was dead, and seemed cheap, as well as the IR receiver/transmitter setup.

ASUS My Cinema-PE9400
But I was impressed enough with the idea of it that I returned the Hauppauge and ordered the ASUS My Cinema-PE9400 from Newegg for the same price and had it a couple days later. Same easy installation, but this time the picture in Media Center was much clearer for the same channels and low and behold, the remote works...Damn well too! In addition to all that, the Asus come with more, higher quality swag, the remote receiver is solid and substantial, unlike the small chunk of plastic on the end of a wire that the Hauppauge. And the remote seem like something you might pay 20-30 bucks for separately. I can’t get any channels off of the “Digital Antenna” that came with the kit, but there may not be any channels to be had. Also if you don’t want to use Media Center (I don’t see why not) the Asus comes with a decent piece of software for you to use.

Media Center
Both TV tuners functioned very well in Vista Media Center, the Asus works with a remote, the Hauppauge doesn’t. But the Guide, Pause, Rewind, Record, and Record Series functions all work amazingly well. And setup in MCE is easy-peasy with any compatible card.

Conclusion
The Asus is clearly a better deal than the Hauppauge hvr 1600, and I suspect that it is also a better deal than both of the other higher priced options such as the Hauppauge wintv hvr1800 MCE or the Avermedia option.

[ViciousXUSMC]

Finally in all of google land, somebody that answered (part) of my question.

That is between the Hauppauge 1800 & the Asus PE9400 witch is better (the 1600 & 1800 are the same besides the interface as far as I can tell). After reading all the new egglet reviews where the blind lead the blind I sort of figured the Asus was better, but Hauppauge has a good name behind it and my other tech friends were more reluctant to recommend it.

So Asus it is.... after I can get the other half my question finally answered.

Im building a HTPC... and I have one major obstacle. My TV service is Direct TV and the signal it uses is propitiatory so not a single tuner card out there is going to let me use my service directly. My only option is to just use the video out from the DTV box and hook it to the video in of one of these cards.

We can then use are existing DTV remote, or I can try the IR blaster stuff to control it.

Now here is the question, I know the analog and digital tuner works in Vista's Media Center, but I have absolutely no use for them since I cant use them (big waist of money eh?) but what about the video-in (the S-Video port) is it seamlessly integrated into WMC also?

The only solution I know that works is the HAVA & the Pinnacle HD TV to Go deal, both of those units will take any video source and stream it over your WAN/LAN and creates a virtual tuner in WMC to watch the streams, but they are expensive and the main purpose is to stream your video from one place to another, kind of a waist when my STB is right next to the HTPC & TV.

Plus then I would have to have this big unit connected to a switch or something, its just not worth it when tiny internal card should do the job just fine.

If I cant get it to work where we can watch TV inside WMC I dont think I can get my wife to support the idea of a HTPC, I want it to feel like a part of the entertainment sytem and not just a PC hooked to the TV (cause I have 3 laptops and 3 computers already lol, she wont let me get another) I also want to keep it cheap, when I can build a top notch gaming rig with dual cards for $1200 I should not even need half of that for a HTPC.

Here is my parts list: https://secure.newegg.com/WishList/MySavedWishDetail.aspx?ID=11010688

I really appreciate the feedback and help.

[Brandontw]

I'm glad i helped somebody(partially).

That's why i posted this because i was lost in google land for a bit when shopping for these too.

I cant speak to whether or not the S-video input works good in Media Center, as i have not used it, nor do i have a need or a way to try it.

Anyway, hope you got your rig figured out.

[JaY_III]

I did not like the ASUS card at all.
Picture Quality was not any better than my old WinTV-PVR USB2

The included software didnt work for me, so i was unable to View CLEAR QAM
Media Center doesn't support Clear QAM yet either (looking into getting some hack for that now)

Anyhow ended up picking up a WinTV-HVR 2250.
It has true Dual tuners so i can record on show while watching another.

The Asus claims to be able to do that, but is very misleading.
As it only has 1 analog tunner the other a Digital for Clear QAM.
So you cant really watch a show and record another at the same time.

If you are looking for a tuner the Hauppauge 2250 is truly the standard that other tuners must match.